Angela was asleep when Kurt came home at three in the morning. She had finished a bottle of wine by herself and passed out alone before the New Year had arrived.
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Copyrighted Material
Chapter 37
After the holidays, Gary studied Eliana’s complaint, skillfully honed with unassailable factual support. It claimed legal malpractice based, in large part, on his sexual harassment.
“Fucking bitch.” Gary was irate because everything she alleged had happened and was true.
I can beat her, he thought. She’s nothing but an hysterical divorcing female—a crying ball of blabber.
He would deny everything in the complaint, but he could not get back to small claims court because of the dollar amount Eliana claimed in damages. Gary filed his well-honed answer to her complaint on the last possible day, at the last possible minute.
The discovery requests from Kurt? Gary ignored them. Being a sole practitioner, he “just couldn’t get to it.”
He still very regularly got to Brianna, though. He always had time for that.
* * *
In February, Kurt called Gary to do the court-required telephonic meet and confer addressing Gary’s lack of response to the discovery. Gary never “had time” to take or return the calls.
Stonewalled—Kurt’s only option was to waste more of his billable hours preparing and filing motions to compel Gary to respond to all the discovery and for sanctions.
Of course, just as Kurt finished his motions, Gary’s responses came. They were non-responsive, boilerplate, and merely listed a litany of baseless objections to all Kurt’s discovery.
Now Gary had answered, Kurt’s motions to compel were a total waste, as was his billable time preparing them. He had to shift gears and drafted motions specifically addressing Gary’s inadequate responses and asking Judge Vega to find Gary’s repetitive, pro forma objections baseless and requiring him to submit substantive responses.
* * *
At the discovery motion hearing in front of Judge Vega, Kurt lost every argument in whole or in part. He was home-courted by Gary who had a well-established good reputation with Judge Vega and her clerk. Judge Vega was overtly in Gary’s corner: local lawyer, substantial bar activities, and a pillar of the San Bernardino community—thanks to Mary’s charity work and Gary’s ass-kissing at Bar events and Mary’s parties.
The judge made a showing of fairness by doing a balancing act on the record before she ruled in Gary’s favor on each issue. However, it was impossible for her to rule that Gary and Vicky didn’t have to attend their depositions. Vega did delay them a month after Gary’s well-rehearsed soliloquy whining about his sole practitioner status whose first priority was to his many clients.
* * *
During the hearing, it was clear to Kurt from Judge Vega’s comments that she didn’t believe that any divorce lawyer would do what Eliana had alleged, especially homespun Gary Stockton—a stalwart of the community and the San Bernardino County Bar Association.
Kurt studied the interactions between Gary and Vega and thought, They were … familiar. Unusually familiar. That was the only word for it.
Kurt noted the judge’s eyes glisten when Gary spoke and her. It was not the cold hard stare Kurt, Eliana, and her sister got.
Predictably, he got no access to Gary’s cell phone records—the judge had deemed them personal and irrelevant as Gary asserted, blithely lying as he did so. He lied under oath quite convincingly, stating he never used his cell phone for business.
Everything else Kurt requested Gary got the judge to deny as attorney work product or protected by the attorney-client privilege—though it wasn’t. He couldn’t even get access to electronic discovery from Gary’s office computers. As to them, Gary lied and said he had produced everything electronic related to Eliana and had a declaration from Vicky backing him up. Vicky had balked at first about signing the declaration, which she knew was filled with lies, but in the face of Gary’s veiled threat of firing her resistance had crumbled.
Every time Judge Vega ruled against Kurt she urged the parties to settle. Her message was clear—too clear. Gary reveled in that message. Settlement would be on his terms. If this did go to trial, both men knew Gary would have the upper hand in his own town with Judge Vega presiding over the trial.
Gary was emboldened by each of his discovery victories—cumulatively a landslide.
In the end, he literally only had to produce his doctored Thurston file, the one Kurt already had extracted by force. He and Vicky had to attend their delayed depositions as well, which didn’t bother Gary for a second.
* * *
After the hearing ended in the courthouse hallway, Gary followed Kurt out with his poochy stomach leading. He seethed at the fit young man in his expensive suit.
“Not so easy losing is it, Mr. Big Time?” Gary called making sure the security cameras were angled at them.
Kurt whipped around with his huge trial case and stopped cold in front of Gary. “What did you say, you bastard?”
The two men’s eyes locked. Gary stared into eyes he had never encountered before—intelligent, fearless, and threatening like a razor’s edge—they were mind-freezing black holes of pure evil in his mind.
Gary laughed in Kurt’s face. “I said not so easy to be a loser is it, Mr. big-time law school grad?”
Kurt’s blood boiled. His energy exploded into his right fist to punch the smile off Gary’s face. If it hadn’t been gripped around the handle of his trial case, he would have. However, this split second of mechanical ineptitude, coupled with Gary glancing up at the security camera, was enough to bring Kurt to his senses.
A setup. Kurt calmed himself and, in turn, taunted Gary. “I wouldn’t know, Gary. This is only one battle, not the war.”
Kurt turned dismissively and left.
Not as a disappointed Gary had planned, though, with Kurt arrested for assaulting him and escorted by the police in handcuffs to the local station. No matter. His victories and Kurt’s humiliation in front of Vega were enough for now.
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Copyrighted Material
Chapter 38
Gary was pleased with his tactical defense against Kurt’s motion to compel discovery. Irritatingly, though, as this suit had ballooned, his life and sleep became tormented again by his past resurfacing—Zaida’s crushed neck, Kim’s bloody death, and Skip’s wild eyes.
Gary hated Eliana, the day she walked into his office, and the fact he had started the lawsuit against. Tough. It had gone too far to back down now, and he was sure with Judge Vega at the helm he would prevail.
Why not? She was clearly indicating, by her many rulings against Kurt, that she doubted Eliana’s credibility.
* * *
Kurt was sorry he had ever agreed to help Eliana and sorry he ever met Angela.
Vicky’s and Gary’s depositions went as badly as the written discovery. Gary acted as Vicky’s attorney and had prepared her well. They both answered almost nothing, claiming attorney-client privilege, attorney work product and lack of relevance, just as Gary had in dealing with Kurt’s written discovery requests.
When Kurt pressed for answers Gary smiled. “Take it to the judge.”
As Gary knew, Kurt’s only option was to take it before Judge Vega for a motion to compel answers to his questions, a motion predestined to fail. Kurt had no leverage to get answers.
Toward the end of the deposition day, Kurt took a break and skimmed his notes. He concluded Vicky’s few errors and Gary’s show-off posturing on the record in the depositions along with the falsified discovery responses, production of documents, and Eliana’s doctored case files were enough—just barely enough—to prevent any reasonable judge from granting Gary a summary judgment.
That would have to be enough. A summary judgment pre-trial motion would get rid of Eliana’s complaint in total with no trial —a pre-trial victory for Gary and dismissal of Eliana’s whole cross-complaint.
Kurt st
opped the depositions.
He thought, Good enough. Let these snakes crawl back under their San Bernardino rocks. I’ll get them at trial on the stand.
He drove home from San Bernardino in the winding red-light brake morass in the rush hour back to his office.
* * *
Kurt filed a respectable motion to compel Vicky and Gary to answer the numerous unanswered deposition questions. His obligations as Eliana’s trial lawyer left him no choice. Gary opposition was abysmal, citing old precedents, some of which had even been overturned by later cases, and making absurd convoluted, almost incoherent arguments. It made no difference.
After a perfunctory hearing, Judge Vega denied Kurt’s motion in its entirety based on attorney-client privilege and work product. Vega found Eliana’s waiver of privilege irrelevant to her findings.
That her rulings made no sense under the law didn’t matter. All that did was that Kurt wasn’t getting any more answers from Gary or Vicky. He was being jerked around by Gary and Judge Vega the enabler.
Vega wasn’t a judge at all worthy of the title. She was a placeholder who entertained herself from the bench and relished being liked by the local bar association—and for some reason by Gary himself.
* * *
The following two months, Kurt did his legal duty for Eliana’s lawsuit but with no enthusiasm. He was incensed at losing every motion before Vega and her biases barely disguised as she looked down at him from the bench, her double chin jiggling over her white-collared black robe.
* * *
As Eliana’s case dragged on, Angela resented her incessant phone calls and enduring her blabbering presence on nights when William had their boys. Kurt resented Angela’s coddling of her sister and avoided coming home on those nights—and gradually more nights. He was always “working.”
The Eliana time-suck also made Angela miss critical deadlines at work. She lost an important client of a major partner. Once a rising star she was now in jeopardy of her job at her advertising agency.
Kurt didn’t miss a step at work but was increasingly tired and angry having to make up his billable hours.
* * *
After unpleasant, tearful, and unending pleas from Eliana, Kurt had to approach Dee and Jim to see if they would take charge of her divorce proceedings, too. Kurt refused to spend more non-billable time learning a whole new area of the law. Reluctantly, one evening he finally got up the nerve to go to Dee’s office and ask for the favor.
He waited while Dee perused the file and her shadow Jim watched. They knew the facts from Eliana’s lawsuit against Gary. The focus was different here. How much trouble would taking it be and how expensive time-wise?
Dee looked at Jim. He nodded his okay. Then, she caught Kurt’s nervous grin. She laughed that infamous laugh—alone but unabashed.
“Kurt, don’t look so worried. We’ll handle this for you.”
Jim smiled, “Piece of cake.”
“Thank you. I owe you both big.”
Dee handed the file to Jim. “Eliana’s husband’s divorce lawyer is Bryan Sorrell, a frenemy. He’s at Ehrman, Hazeltine & Felix, a great firm. We tangle often enough, but also do endless family law continuing education panels together for the L.A. County Bar Association.”
Jim added for Kurt’s benefit, “I’ve seen them playing off each other. They’re both rock stars.”
“Thanks.” Dee smiled. “We’ve settled several high profile divorces. Bryan’s straight and direct. With any cooperation from Eliana and William, this will resolve in no time.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure. He’s too busy to drag anything out.”
“Thank you. It is so far from my expertise.”
“But not mine and Jim’s.”
“I’ll copy the file and get it to you today.”
Kurt didn’t admit that he just couldn’t deal with Eliana and Angela anymore. Emotion, and especially the cathartic loud Greek emoting of which he had now seen and heard far too much, was not his thing.
“I really appreciate it.”
“Remember you owe Jim and me big now.” Dee winked. “Only teasing you. Get out of here.”
Kurt made for the door without another word.
* * *
Dee was right. She and Jim prepped for a telephonic negotiation with Sorrell and spent all of two hours hammering out a settlement agreement that finalized everything—shared custody of the three kids, temporary support for Eliana, and a division of all of their community property assets, including not only their house but William’s 401k. The 401k Gary had negligently forgotten.
Dee made a far better deal for Eliana than Gary ever could or would have. As was reasonable, Dee agreed that each party would pay their own attorney fees. She then waived her fees for Eliana, which were minimal anyway. That move purposefully left the extra fees Gary had billed to Eliana unpaid, and their lawsuit alive. After all, Dee was in the middle of making new law and bolstering her reputation.
Even with the settlement in place, Eliana continued to pester Kurt about Gary’s lawsuit and bothering him with her emotional meltdowns.
As for Angela, she was much more concerned about her own career and getting Kurt to come home at night again.
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Copyrighted Material
Chapter 39
After the long and obstructive discovery battles ended, Gary did file a motion for a summary adjudication to get Eliana’s entire complaint dismissed as a matter of law and, as a backup, he sought summary adjudication of issues to try to get rid of some of her causes of actions. He was giving Judge Vega a way to get rid of all or part Eliana’s complaint without a trial.
Gary had been preparing his motion for weeks. Its focus was deceptively simple: he asserted that there were no disputed material facts and the undisputed facts supported him under the law. End of story, end of case. Eliana’s case against him, that is.
Denying any fraud, Gary also and more importantly argued that, as a matter of law, his alleged sexual advances toward Eliana didn’t amount to assault, battery or any kind of gender violence—and certainly not malpractice.
At his request, Judge Vega accelerated the usual time limits before there could be a hearing on such motions based on Gary’s good cause to do that—though he had none.
Vega merely wanted her calendar cleared of this petty squabble and believed Eliana was a liar. And while the law didn’t allow a judge to weigh witness credibility on summary judgment or summary adjudication motions, she didn’t care. Vega believed Gary was ethical and honest. She could and would justify doing anything she wanted with enough legal mumbo-jumbo on the record.
* * *
“It’s not badly drafted.” Dee threw the motion down on her desk.
Kurt said, “This guy Stockton has obviously had this in his back pocket for months.”
Jim flipped through the statement of undisputed facts supporting the motion. “But there are holes. Big holes. He states the key facts are undisputed, but it’s not true. The judge can’t grant any of this.”
“Technically, yes.” Dee drank her black coffee. “But judges are lazy. They’d rather grant these things than conduct a trial or do justice.”
Kurt said, “It’s more than that here. Vega has ruled against us at every turn. We’re the big city outsiders and Gary the hometown sole practitioner.”
Jim said, “Clearly Vega is rushed, lazy, and biased. Hell, look here, Stockton edited Eliana’s own answers to interrogatories to support his argument. Vega won’t even notice the edits and redacted sentences. We’ll have to spoon feed her each error and hope she gives enough of a damn to read what we submit.”
Kurt said, “She won’t … too tedious.”
“Can you win it?” Dee asked Kurt.
“With a fair judge, sure I could. No, I’ll amend that. I would.”
“Do your best.”
As Kurt left, he thought, This is a waste. I should have paid Gary’s bill myself and put an end to it. Angela and he
r family be damned.
* * *
Like any litigator, and despite it all, Kurt did put in the hours. Stockton had thrown down the gauntlet and the game was on. Jim helped as much as he could but was swamped.
Kurt was pissed when Eliana balked at letting him use the most salacious details from her deposition. So he ignored her.
Beggars can’t be choosers.
Besides, the professional reputations of Kurt, Jim, and Dee were at stake. This sleazoid Stockton was going to be kicked back under the rock where he lived. Kurt resented Stockton and Vega and every minute this case took away from his commercial litigation practice—it was personal now.
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Copyrighted Material
Chapter 40
The hearing on Gary’s motion was on Friday, July 1, a hot, smoggy San Bernardino afternoon. Eliana and Angela insisted that Kurt take them in his car so they could “talk”—and they did the whole way. Kurt drove and grunted occasionally at their emotional time-wasting harangues.
* * *
Eliana’s case was the last matter on the calendar. The gallery of the courtroom slowly emptied until only the two women, Gary, the judge, her bailiff, and the court reporter remained. Eliana sat at the counsel table with Kurt. Gary was at the defense table alone—alone but prepped and eager to crush this troublemaker, this woman who had defied him.
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